Currently at Sony Computers (SCEE) as Web Services Manager.Strong service management background, focused on technology outsourcing over the past 12 months (at EMI), and looking to implement positive change at SCEE to enhance the deliverability of our services by implementing standard processes, and making key strategic decisions early on. Smart generalist when it comes to programming – no expert in any specific field. Covering PHP, ASP.NET, Objective C, javascript, html, xml, css.

History

Let’s start from the beginning. Back in 1998 I started creating a website for my band at the time. The seed was sewn, and I was soon addicted to HTML. Back then life was simple, MS Notepad and a dodgy image editor – great times they were. I soon created a few more sites, started a small record label idea, and helped out friends with their sites.

Meanwhile I had left college prematurely, and decided the school of life was for me! My first real IT job was as an Access Database administrator in a facilities firm. Wasn’t that exciting, but it at least enabled me to kick off my life in Technology. Whilst there I was still creating sites – my first success was a small “fan-site” I created for a band on Capitol Records called Shivaree. I had seen the band on a TV show called “Jools Holland”, yet when looking them up on the net, I couldn’t find anything, so I started to gleam as much information from the web as possible and munch it altogether as a fan site.

It was at this point when I started to dabble in Flash. This was a little bit before flash had gone really mainstream. Most people at the time were using it to create cartoon animations (Anyone remember Radiskull?) or a take off of a BackStreet Boys song called “I Want a Fat Babe”… Anyway, I digress.

So, my fan-site soon picked up and got the attention of EMI/Capitol as well as the band themselves. I got the chance to meet the band a few times and interview them for the site, and at one point we were talking about using my site as the official site for their next album release on the payroll at Capitol.

For whatever reason, that never happened – but it was at this time that I started to talk to a small UK indie label called Taste Media about their websites (my sister worked there and put me in touch). Taste’s biggest act were Muse and a few smaller acts, one being Serafin. I was asked to put together a site for Serafin – I don’t know what I got out of it other than the experience, but it was worthwhile… Within a month the MD of Taste asked me to join the company as the owner of all of their New Media.

So, this is now around 2001. I began work at Taste fulltime running all of their websites, as well as being the general IT man around town, fixing network issues, Macs and whatever else. I was also involved in creating all of the artwork layouts for CDs, Vinyls, flyers and other press stuff like magazine ads etc. Good fun and pretty much merged my love of music and technology into one.

After about a year at Taste I started to get the itch. People kept asking me if I could create a site for them, and so I started to think – wow I could start doing this for real. So, I ended up starting my own small web design company back in mid 2002. Taste were still a client, I contracted for them 3 days a week, as well as branching out to other areas.

It was at this point where I got into PHP and MySQL. I can’t remember why I needed to, but anyway I did. I started to create smallish websites with a basic CMS behind them, worked out pretty well. Anyway, around early 2003 I began to work with a client called Rock Sound Magazine. For those not in the know, these guys are one of the biggest UK Rock Music magazines in the UK, and the world. I developed their new website from scratch, as well as built a CMS behind to allow them to manage all the content.

I worked with Rock Sound for I think nearly 2 years on and off. Meanwhile, the rest of my web design business was just bumbling along without much to say for itself… A few dodgy clients, people that didn’t pay me, and a few that were complete idiots soon had me thinking twice about whether it was the right time for me to be self employed in my life.

Early 2005 came around and I was struggling. I was still working with Rock Sound, but I wanted more… This has always been my problem… I want more. When I get it, I’m satisfied for a little bit, then I want more again, take a step up, progress. I hate standing still for too long. One of my smaller clients were a recruitment agency – I was doing their website, yet they also had an inhouse database system where they managed all their clients, candidates and jobs that was completely cut off from the web. I saw an opportunity.

So yes, early 2005 and I embarked on a new major project. It was a CMS for recruitment agencies which allowed them to bridge their in house work, with their web presence – the plan being they both used the same back end to drive the 2 in-house and external front ends. I quickly made progress within 2 months or so and managed to sell the product in its early stages to a small recruitment company.

However, my real lack of business knowledge was kicking me in the balls right now. I just didn’t have time to develop, manage my clients, and find new business. I was living on the craziest small amount of money – getting into big time debt, and losing control of everything. So around April 2005 I called it quits. Time to get a real job and get some experience in the world.

In June 2005 I began work at EMI as a Web Support Analyst. This role was basically to support the business for all of our small internal web applications, as well as on their in house CMS Sharepoint. Sharepoint proved to be the glue that stuck me to EMI for quite some time. I quickly became the “expert” within EMI for Sharepoint, I began developing web parts for our internal portal in .Net and managing the change and release process. During this time I also became ITIL qualified.

In early 2007 EMI announced that they were outsourcing all development within EMI to an offshore company – which unfortunately included my role, so I was put up for possible redundancy. It was around this time that I had got the itch again anyway, and wanted the dreaded “more”… Luckily, EMI had positions with the new Technology organisation, so I took the opportunity to interview for a Business Analyst role.

So mid 2007 I became a BA within EMI. Myself and the other BAs were the loosest BAs I’d ever known. In fact, I don’t think we ever got time to do any business analysis because we spent most of our time dealing with the day to day issues of outsourcing on a grand scale in a small amount of time.

Towards the end of the year my manager left EMI, and they weren’t in a position to replace him. My little girl Scarlett had just been born, and EMI had another challenge for me on my return from paternity leave – as acting Global Applications Manager for BI and Portal applications. I actually had no interest in BI at all, however unfortunately Sharepoint was involved somewhere, so that’s why Portals and BI got lumbered together.

Spent pretty much the majority of the next 6-9 months fighting fires with our outsourcing partner and trying to push forward with change in our global applications. EMI had pushed through the offshore activities in a scary amount of time, and we were paying for it after supposed “go-live”. If anyone ever wants any info on outsourcing, call me! I’m well matured in that arena

Come mid 2008, EMI again was having a huge shake up within the organisation, and they saw fit to put me on notice for possible redundancy again. Bah! I was more than a little annoyed for various reasons, one mainly being because they didn’t actually want me to leave, they just wanted me to apply for a different new role they had created. So, I did what I had to do and interviewed for a Service Manager role. This was pretty much exactly what I was already doing, but it would be official, so no qualms there.

From that point onwards, EMI was in meltdown as far as I could see. It’s no secret that they were going through huge organisational change, removing 1/3 of the workforce and shaking it up good and proper. The uncertainty, lack of strategy and lack of leadership from EMI Technology management was pushing me and pretty much everyone else out of the door. I needed a new challenge – I had done my time with the outsourcing project, so I began to look elsewhere.

Around this time (November 2008) I started work on Chatterbloc. You can read about that project here.

In January 2009 I started a Sony Computer Entertainment Europe as Web Services Manager. The itch has gone, and there are plenty of challenges there to keep me going for many years to come I am sure. I can’t really say much more of my time at Sony as I’m under NDA, but suffice to say, think Playstation and my job title and you can make the rest up yourself. It’s an exciting place to be and I look forward to achieving greatness there.

This blog was started in January 2009. I micro-blog on Twitter – check it out.